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You’ll see this a lot online: “Is your computer running slow? Then clean your registry!”. Obviously, these statements often come bundled with a 40$ software that claims to drastically increase your computer’s performance by simply cleaning it’s registry. In this article I’ll test out one of these registry cleaners to see if they actually work.

First off, what is the Registry?

The Windows Registry is a large database that stores both Windows’ settings and those of the programs you install. It was designed as an alternative to *.INI files, which were slow and cumbersome.

Why do we supposedly need to clean it?

Those who sell registry cleaners state that we need to clean the registry because, over time, it becomes riddled with unused data (keys) that negatively impact performance and cause system errors. While it is true that the registry slowly fills up with obsolete data, is it true that this slows down the computer? Should you really clean your registry?

On to our tests:

Before cleaning our registry, we need to assess the computer’s performance using the Passmark benchmark. These were the results we obtained:

Next, we open RegClean Pro and scan our Registry. The program found a total of 668 errors.

We then ask RegClean to fix these errors.

Now that our Registry’s clean, let’s test our performance anew:

As you can see, there’s virtually no change in performance. If anything, we’ve actually scored lower (-1.09%) that we did before cleaning the registry. But we aren’t finished yet.

RegClean also has an option to “Defrag” the registry, which apparently also improves performance, so we ran the Defrag analysis, and RegClean reported that the registry was 4.6% fragmented.

Therefore, we ran the Registry defragmenter, which took a few minutes (we had to restart the computer). Once this was over, we did another Benchmark, and this is what we obtained:

As you can see, there still isn’t any significant change. The slight increase in the score (+2.65%) might as well be due to the fact that we’ve just restarted the computer.

Summary

In conclusion, Registry cleaners, or at least RegClean, DID NOT increase our computer’s performance. If you really want to speed up your computer, you’re better off saving your money for better hardware. Instead of spending 40$ on a Registry cleaner, use it buy a stick of RAM. Or, even better, save up for a better video card or processor.

That concludes this article. I hope you’ve enjoyed it and don’t forget to come back for more!

File fragmentation can be a real plague on traditional hard drives. They slow down your entire computer, while reducing the life expectancy of the drive. But how does this come to be? Why is it that files somehow end up scattered across the whole drive?

It’s actually quite simple. Imagine the hard drive as being a series of boxes, each one capable of holding 1 byte of information (in reality, it would be more accurate to think of these boxes as holding 1 bit of information, but for the sake of simplicity, we’ll just think of them as storing 1 byte):

When the hard drive is new, all of these boxes are empty.Now, let’s say we store a 3 byte file on the drive. This file will fill up three boxes.

Now, we add a new 14 byte file to our drive, the computer appends this data to the previous file. At this point, we still have no file fragmentation.

Now, let’s say we delete the first file. This leaves us with some free boxes before and after File 2.

As you can see, we now have 6 bytes of free space on our hard drive. But, does that mean we can add a new 5 byte file? Indeed, we can, but we now encounter a problem, which is that we only have 3 byte of contiguous free space. This means that the computer will need to split this new file into 2 parts:

So now, to read File 3, the hard drive head (the “needle” that reads and writes data to the drive) must jump over several blocks of memory. This makes the operation slower and more damaging to the hard drive.

Windows 8.1 is a pretty nice operating system. It’s fast, stable and offers a bunch of cool features. This being said, I absolutely despise the Metro interface. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great on tablets, but it just sucks when you’re using a keyboard and mouse. That’s why, in this article, I’ll show you a way to bring back the Windows 7 start menu in Windows 8.1.

Keep in mind that we won’t be installing the actual Windows 7 start menu, but rather a nice imitation.

Have you even wanted to explore a Minecraft world without facing constant lag because the map is being generated? A good way to avoid this is by pre-generating your world. This can also be useful if you’re hosting a Minecraft server and want to provide your visitors with a map of the world.

So how do we do this? Well, it’s actually fairly simple. The first thing we need to do is to download a program called “Minecraft Land Generator”, which is available here: https://sites.google.com/site/minecraftlandgenerator/home/download. What this program does is it generates terrain by constantly changing the spawn point of a Minecraft Server.

Once you’ve downloaded and extracted Minecraft Land Generator, you’ll want to click on “MLG_Initial_Setup_Windows.cmd”. This will prepare the program.

Once this is done, we’re ready to create a map. Click on “Run_MLG_Windows.cmd” and enter the desired world size.

Note: If you want to change the seed of your world, simply change the seed specified in the “server.properties” file that was created when you ran “MLG_Initial_Setup_Windows.cmd”. Now, you simply need to wait for the program to finish creating your world!

Keep in mind that, with taxes and shipping, the price will be slightly above 400$

Why I chose these parts:

Case:

The NZXT Source 210 S210-001 is a pretty basic case (which is what we would expect for 40$). I chose it because it was inexpensive yet offered all the basic options we could want for a 400-500$ Gaming PC. It supports both Micro ATX and ATX motherboards, has an impressive total of 8 Internal 3.5″ Drive Bays and supports 6 fans (1 included with the case) for good airflow. The case is also quite roomy and feels sturdy. It’s biggest drawback is the fact that it looks like something out of the nineties… it’s just plain ugly in my opinion. Nonetheless, for the price, it’s a great case.

Motherboard:

The motherboard is pretty much the most important part of a computer, so you want something good. The ASRock FM2A78M-HD+ is perfect for our budget. It’s inexpensive (55$), supports FM2 and FM2+ APUs (which is necessary for our processor) and has 6 SATA slots. It even supports USB 3.0! What I didn’t like about this board is the fact that there are just 2 memory slots, but for this price, we can’t ask for more.

Optical Drive:

There’s not much to say here, the ASUS 24X DVD Burner is just a standard DVD drive, which is all we’ll need for this computer. If you ever wish to turn this build into a HTPC (Home theater PC), then you can switch this drive for a BLU-ray one, but this is unnecessary for gaming.

Power Supply:

This computer is not particularly power hungry, so the 500W EVGA power supply will be more than enough. This model is reliable, inexpensive and relatively efficient with it’s 80 PLUS rating. Also, if you ever wish to upgrade this computer, then the EVGA 100-W1-500-KR should still be able to pump out enough power.

CPU/Video card:

Had we had a bigger budget, I definitely wouldn’t have chosen an AMD APU for this computer. Unfortunately though, there’s not much we can do with 400$. This being said, the A10-6800K is surprisingly powerful. It boasts an impressive 4.1GHzquad-core processor and a reasonable Radeon HD 8670D GPU. Furthermore, this unit has an unlocked multiplier, so it’s easy to overclock. This being said, If you have a higher budget, I recommend that you replace this APU with a CPU+Video card combo. You’ll get much better performance with something like a Radeon HD7770 and an Intel Core i3-4130. Keep in mind though that, if you decide to use a different processor/GPU combo, you’ll also need a different motherboard!

RAM:

You really can’t get less than 4 Gigabytes of RAM nowadays. This being said, gaming doesn’t usually require that much memory (unless you’re running a 150 slot Minecraft server ;)). These two G.SKILL Ripjaws units should be enough for most games. It’s good quality ram that runs at 1600 MHz and comes with a nice heatsink. All-in-all, it’s just about perfect for this build.

Storage:

With games getting constantly bigger, you’ll need lots of hard drive space. This Western Digital Blue drive offers a respectable 1TB of disk space at a reasonable price. It also has pretty good read/write speeds, although if you really want speed, go for an SSD. If you feel like 1TB isn’t enough, you can always buy two of these drives.

Conclusion:

This article shows that, even with a very tight budget, you can still get decent performance. This 400$ gaming computer build will be able to play most games at reasonable settings. If you think you could get better performance by using different parts, feel free to let us know in the comment section down below!

Also, keep in mind that you’re probably better off spending 500-600$ on your computer. You’ll get much better performance than this build for just a slight increase in price.

The other day, I was casually watching a Minecraft stream when suddenly, Steam decides it might be a good idea to update some of my games. Now, this wouldn’t be a problem if I had a better Internet connection, but this isn’t the case…

Obviously, the Steam updates took up ALL of my bandwidth, making the stream impossible to watch. This pissed my off to no end, so I decided to scour the web for a way to limit a program’s internet bandwidth.

Turns out, it’s actually a fairly easy thing to do. The first thing you need to do is to download and install a program called NetBalancer (the free version is more than enough for our needs). NetBalancer can be found here: https://netbalancer.com/

Once NetBalancer is finished installing, open it. You’ll see something like this:

Now, let’s say we want to limit the download speed of Google Chrome. We first need to select the relevant process (in this case, chrome.exe):

Now, we need to click on the half-filled green arrow icon:

We then set the desired download limit and press Ok.

And there you go, the program should now have a limited download speed, and therefore won’t monopolize your internet connection.

Did you ever think about how awesome it would be if you could add custom recipes to your Minecraft server? Perhaps a way to craft horse armour or cobwebs? Well, this is precisely what we are going to do in today’s article!

To make this possible, we need to install a fantastic Craftbukkit plugin called Craftbook. This plugin is possibly the best thing since sliced bread. Seriously, Craftbook is a must for every Minecraft server. It just adds so many interesting mechanics, such as sittable chairs, cooking pots, easy painting switching… and of course, custom recipes!

In this article, I’ll just talk about custom recipes, but I strongly recommend that you check out the other features of Craftbook. They’re all awesome and worth your time (I might talk about them in an upcoming article)!

Once you’ve installed all of these plugins, start your server. We now need to activate the Custom Crafting mechanic (all Craftbook mechanics are disabled by default.)

You can do this by editing the Craftbook “config.ylm” file (located in the plugins\CraftBook folder). Open the file in Wordpad and scroll down until you see the following two line:

custom-crafting: enable: false

Change it to:

custom-crafting: enable: true

And reload the server.

Ok! You should now be able to create your own recipes. Let’s make one for cobweb. The way we do this is by putting the recipe in the three leftmost rows of our inventory, and then putting the output object next to the recipe, as such:

Where <Recipe Name> is the name you give your recipe (not really important) and <Recipe Type> is either Shapeless, Shaped or Furnace (Additional information regarding the recipe types can be found at this page: http://wiki.sk89q.com/wiki/CraftBook/Custom_crafting). Basically, shaped recipes are the ones for which the way you place the ingredients is important, while, in shapeless recipes, you can put the ingredients in any order. Furnace recipes are the simplest, they simply specify what happens when you cook something.

In my case, I’ll be typing the following command:

/recp save Cobweb shaped

Once your recipe is saved, you can test it out by using a crafting table:

And there you go, that how you add custom recipes to your Minecraft Server!

If you feel like you haven’t perfectly understood this tutorial, I recommend you watch the following video:

That concludes this tutorial, I hope you’ve enjoyed it and have a nice day!

When you wish to showcase your latest and best build, typical screenshots just don’t cut it. Instead, you’ll want to render your masterpiece in a picture worthy of Thomas Kinkade. But how can you do this?

Once you’re finished installing Chunky, open it.You’ll see something like this:

Make sure the Java and Minecraft directories are correct (they will be unless you’ve installed Java/Minecraft into a weird folder), then click Launch.

Now, you need to open your Minecraft world in Chunky. To do this, click on Select World and then choose your world from the list (if your world is singleplayer) or browse for the world if you’re using a standalone server. Chunky will then load the map.

The next step is to select the chunks that will be rendered in the final image. In other words, we need to select the area around which we want to take our ‘screenshot’ . To do this, press and hold shift, then click and drag around the desired area.

Note: In the Options tab, there’s a button that allows you to load a custom texture pack for your render. I strongly recommend you use this. In my case, I’m using the Conquest texture pack.

Now that we’ve selected the relevant area, we can go to the 3D Render tab and click on New Scene. This will open up two windows, the Render Controls window and the Render Preview window.In the Render Preview window, move the camera around (using the mouse and arrow keys) until you’re satisfied with it’s position.

Now, we need to configure the Render Controls. I used the following settings, but I recommend you experiment to find what’s best for you.

Note: Setting high values for SSP target (greater that one thousand) will drastically increase the time it takes for the image to render.

When you’re satisfied with your settings, click Start. All that’s left to do now is to wait for it to finish rendering!

Here’s a side-by-side comparison of a screenshot taken in Minecraft versus the Chunky render:

Ever wanted to see your whole Minecraft World at once? There’s something oddly satisfying about seeing all your building in one single picture…

In this article I’ll show you just that: how to create a map of your Minecraft World.

The first thing you’ll need to do is to download a neat little program called McMap (there are other alternatives available, but I prefer McMap because it creates an actual PNG file that you can then edit to add in city names, road names, etc.). McMap can be downloaded here: http://wrim.pl/mcmap/

Once you’ve finished downloading the *.zip file, extract it so you see something like this:

If you’re running a 32 bit operating system, go into the mcmap-win32bit folder, while if you’re running a 64 bit operating system, go to the mcmap-win64bit folder. Once this is done, click on mcmapGUI2 to launch McMap. You should see something like this:

Now, we need to configure McMap. First off, select the world for which you want to create a map. Then, select your preferred options and click Start. Once the render is finished, you’ll see Map image written

At this point, go to the same folder in which you launched McMap (mcmap-win32bit or mcmap-win64bit). You should see a PNG file with the same name as your world. This is your brand new map!

Let’s say you wish to build an awesome coastal city, but that you’re unable to find a coast close enough to your existing constructions… Do you start a new map or abandon your project?

In this article, I’ll show you an easy way to create large lakes using a Minecraft plugin called Voxelsniper.

The first thing you’ll need to do is to make sure you have a Craftbukkit server set-up (as far as I know, there’s no way for Voxelsniper to work in singleplayer). Once this is done, download and install Voxelsniper on your server.

Now, go to the place that you want to turn into a lake:

Then, put an arrow in your hand and type /b o.

This turns the arrow into an Oceanator brush, which inverts the terrain and covers it with water, giving you an ocean.

Now, you need to give a size to the Oceanator brush. To do this, type /b <size>, where <size> is a number that represents the size (really!) of the brush. Per example: /b 10.

When you’re done creating the brush, right click the ground with the arrow in your hand in order to turn it into water. Do this until you’re satisfied with the size and rough shape of the lake:

Ok, so now we have our lake, but it looks completely unnatural with those huge cliffs on every side. What we need to do is to smooth out the coast.

Once more, with the arrow in your hand, type /b e melt. Once this is done, right-click all around the lake to smooth out the cliffs:

Notice that, at some places, the water has gone awry after we used the melt brush. To fix this, stand in the water (one block deep) and type /fixwater <radius>, where radius is the approximate size of the lake in blocs, ex: /fixwater 100:

Now it’s starting to look like a lake!

The last thing we might want to do is to replace all the materials around the lake with sand, to create a more natural looking beach.

To do this, type /v sand

then /b b mm

followed by /vr<the material to replace> (in this case, I’ll be replacing the sandstone with sand, so I’ll type /vr sandstone)

You can then set a size for the brush by typing /b <size>.

When you’re finished configuring the brush, right-click (with the arrow in your hand) the area that you wish to convert into sand (Keep in mind that you’ll need to repeat these steps for every material around the lake):

And there you go, that’s an easy way to create a large lake in Minecraft!